I hear your cries Mulugeta..

Your essay deals with issues that are deeply personal to me. I see how everywhere the fruits of Science are put to use as tools of destruction, and as a means for the elite class to subjugate the common people. Indeed, it could be argued that Science has done more harm than good, and disproportionate levels of harm in places like Africa where folks are blameless of some of the excesses of Western society, but bear the brunt of our harsh edges as corporations come more and more to dominate the landscape. Yet even here; developers swoop in, and what used to be forest near my home is now denuded - leaving the wildlife displaced.

I had a heart to heart talk about 10 years ago with Pete Seeger, the well-known and now departed Folk singer, about the subject of your essay! As it turns out; Charles Seeger, Pete's Dad, was a happy go lucky man most of his life, but later became terrified in later years by the horrifying destructive power that scientists were putting in the hands of the world's despots. He mounted a campaign to convince the scientists of the world to stop doing Science, with somewhat different motives from yours, but with every bit as much fervor and earnest intent. You can find a version of the story in Pete's book "Where Have Al the Flowers Gone?" on pages 282-283.

Pete was lecturing me on getting scientists to be responsible for their creations, and the unintended consequences of scientific research, when I was headed to Australia to attend the 10th Frontiers of Fundamental Physics conference. But Pete was much more optimistic about Science than his Dad. He argued that one can't put the genie back in the bottle, so the only solution is to learn more than the folks who created today's problems knew. He felt it was better for people to keep learning and growing, because that's how problems are solved.

I'll continue below.

All the Best,

Jonathan

    Regarding my personal beliefs..

    I hope you are not surprised that I was brought up as a believer in the Christian faith, a Lutheran to be more specific, and I continue to be shaped by those beliefs. I read extensively in the bible, and I also read the learned commentary of both believers and historians. I became a hard-core student of both the Old and New testaments, at one point, and I could likely teach you something about the scriptures. Did you know (for example) there were once two versions of the Torah, because the northern tribes believed in Elohim the Lord, and the southern tribes in YHWH the ineffable God?

    Over time; I also came to read the Bhagavad Gita, Tao te Ching and I Ching, the Analects of Confucius, Buddhist Sutras, the Koran, and so on. However; I don't think anyone should believe in God because of what somebody else wrote! I think people need to try to come to know God, and that if they apply the scientific method to their own experiences they will come to know God exists. I did this also, and learned how to visit where God resides.

    There are a lot of scientists who are believers in God Mulugeta. If you go to the website of Arnold Neumaier at the University of Vienna; you will find he has devoted several pages to scriptural references - citing how the handiwork of God shows up in the subject of Mathematics. The ancient Egyptians taught that the Divine had to fashion its own body first, and then the Cosmos. Over time; I have come to imagine as Peter does above, that the body of God is Mathematics, and that natural law on Earth is a consequence of heavenly law - which is how the Divine became embodied.

    All the Best,

    Jonathan

    For the record..

    I tried several times to respond to your concerns, after reading your essay, but it all fell short of explaining where I stand in a thoughtful way - and it felt hollow. I think there are several wrong-headed ideas in your essay. I also feel it fails to capture some of the most pressing reasons why people should consider stopping scientific research seriously. In addition; you also fail to remain on topic as to how goals and aims come to be, except to assert that they are somehow the gifts of God.

    However; I felt your pain so deeply it was hard to imagine that harsh criticism would do anything to help make things better. So while I don't think to stop doing Science is the answer, I feel your emotional plea in my heart and gut.

    All the Best,

    Jonathan

      By the way Mulugeta..

      Although you might miss it, because I never once mention God in my essay, I do talk about divine creation and the heavenly order right in the middle of page 6. The idea I present is that the higher order found in the heavenly creation inspires humans to take a longer view and do the right thing. That is; by emulating God and the way the Divine works in nature, we are inspired to delay gratification in favor of lasting fulfillment and more meaningful creations on the whole. This is one part of how I see the ways of divinity projected on the affairs of human beings. Do you agree with this assessment?

      All the Best,

      Jonathan

      Dear Mr. Jonathan Dickau,

      I was tied up at work and did not have a chance to visit here in the last few days. I just saw your comment. I can't give you feedback today as I am now exhausted after a long day work. God willing, I will get back to you tomorrow or Saturday.

      Regards,

      Mulugeta

      Dear Mr. Jonathan Dickau,

      I just listened to Pete Seeger's song: 'Where Have all the Flowers Gone', but couldn't find an online version of his book. I will be surprised to find anyone in history who stood against science, because the book of wisdom tells us that it is a rarity. That is why I would like to know a little more about Charles Seeger's campaign that you mentioned. I also heard of this man they call Theodore John Kaczynski who opposed the industrial society. I could see that this man understood science pretty well but he did not understand the Lord God because he was as violent as science itself. So, considerations of meliorating science and its deadly venom are pointless without first considering the spirited path of the Majestic God.

      I also see that you trust more in man's knowledge and that you think applying "the scientific method" will lead to knowing God. The problem is, in the west, applying "the scientific method" did not lead to God. It led to death instead. Man is a created being like other animals, except that God bestowed on man the faculty to consider his Creator. So, by the nature of his creation, man is limited in knowledge as to understand the works of nature as animals have no intuition to the awareness that man has access to. Man's knowledge, as the good book tells us, is the Christ, because, in so doing, man understands all that is good to life. A self aggrandized expedition to knowledge is a vanity, and the proof is, as I have shown in my essay, in the mathematics itself which tells the story that knowledge is forbidden. I understand that the seeking of knowledge by the vain efforts of man is addictive and almost everyone is tempted by it. If knowledge of the nature of things be amenable to the toil of man, then every person on earth should be considered a "scientist" as everyone has a hunch - a plausible explanation - to it. Do you remember the 750 GeV bump the LHC reported? Almost immediately there were many hundreds of elaborate theoretical explanations offered in publications before it was reported the bump never existed. That right there answers all queries about science that it is a vanity and however much men labor to seek the knowledge of nature through their self-extolled intellectual abstractions, they will not find out what it is. Offers of plausible explanation are infinite but true knowledge is one. You don't have infinite time in your hands to find it out. That is why man must seek God as only He can tell us what is good to know or to live for. Also, the act of Christian life is different from western imaginings. Many dismiss Christianity by what abominable crimes the west committed in its name. What these people who dismiss it don't understand is that the west was not Christian but anti-Christian. The west only used Christianity as an instrument of gold digging while at the same time tarnishing its image. However, the west's use of science is different. Science is not something that was good that the west used for bad purposes. No, that is not the case. Science itself is an evil doctrine that inspires man to kill his brother in many ways. Science, the doctrine, imbues man with contempt and drives him towards cleverness and towards skepticism and arms him with derision. Science is a confusion, not a clarity.

      Does science lead to anything that is good? No! It only destroys life on earth. Death -global death - is the whole story about science. Men of science know it too. As reported by CNN, Mr. Stephen William Hawking recently stated that humanity has one thousand years left because of (what science did) 'climate change, nukes, robots'. As in his "black hole" conjecture, he is a liar here too. With science and the beast who wields it, man does not even have twenty five years. Of course there is this lazing in the delusion of 'setting up colonies elsewhere in other solar systems'. The recent euphoria that NASA caused by declaring a false hope of having found a new solar system with seven earths it named the "TRAPPIST-1" is one example. Forty light years away, it will take about twelve thousand years to get there with NASA's rockets. even if we say NASA improved the speed by making it twice as fast, it will take at least six thousand years to fly there. What is the point of salivating for the unobtainable? Man has no chance outside earth that God gave us. To come up with such a ridiculous false hope, science consumes huge recourses of the earth at the same time starving Africans to death. Earth is the sole pleasure and beauty that man has and it would be better for man to dress it and keep it by shutting down all science institutions, industries, nuclear stations, the manufacturing of poison, science thinking, greed and science cultures. Moderate living in the praising of the Lord God shall replace them all.

      An endeavor in the pursuit of science will not take you to any place better. I see that you have musical, mathematical and artistic talents. How pleased would the Lord be (as well as man in the end) if you had used this gift to free man from the damning yokes of science!

      Regards,

      Mulugeta

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